Tag Archives: commitment

^^ A sentence many a man has said over the years and continues to say to this day.

“I want to be lean and strong”

^^ Something I’m pleased to announce more women are saying, it seems there has been a shift in them saying ‘I just want to be skinny’ to now learning the benefit of being lean and strong, it’s great to see.

While it is only my opinion, I feel everybody should be strong.

I’m not talking about record breaking strong, just strong enough to stay healthy and stave off the effects of ageing on the body.

These sports all centre around lifting:

– Weightlifting (olympic lifting)

– Body Building

– Powerlifting

– Strongman

– CrossFit (some may not like this one)

Did you know lifting weights can have the following positive effects on the body:

Personally I’d say the mental improvement is the pivotal one as this can have the biggest impact on a persons life in a very positive way.

However….

If you’re not an athlete and lift for health/confidence you should do it because you enjoy it, not because you feel you have to, that’s the secret to balance and long term sustainability.

Don’t eat yourself up if you miss a session, chalk it up to life and sue it as a rest day, that way you’ll be more motivated when you get to go in, excited to train in fact. Keep this in mind and you’ll find you don’t fall out of love with training.

What if lifting isn’t for you?

That’s cool, find soothing you do enjoy, here are some other options for improving strength and all achieving all the other benefits mentioned above:

The average persons training is rife with program hopping and constant change, is it any wonder people don’t get the results they desire? No, it’s pretty obvious when you look at it.

You may have read about people that change their workouts every 2 weeks but this is often minor tweaks, not to mention these people are often a lot higher up the ladder and closer to their potential genetic limit which requires a more, shall we say, artistic approach to programming.

When it comes to the large majority of people training they would do well to stay on a program for 3months minimum, ideally longer. There would be subtle tweaks in volume/intensity and some accessory work variations but the bulk of the program would stay the same, with good reason too.

Results are bread from consistency.

I can understand that people want the most optimal program for them that will achieve their goals in record time. It’s human nature to want instant gratification, especially since the world we now live in promises you everything at the snap of your fingers, sadly endeavours such as fat loss or lean muscle gain don’t work that way. Until we find a way to break the genetic code down even more you will need to dig deep and prepare for the long haul.

Do you want to know the program you could stay on for this minimum length of time and get results?

Okay, I will tell you.

Ready….

It’s the program you’re currently doing. Be it optimal or not, you will get some form or results if you stick with it for an extended period of time, provided you’ve got sensible nutrition that aligns with your goal that is.

Before you throw out your current program in search of the shiny new, fancily named one you read about on the internet, give yours a chance.